Southern Ming: A boy soldier at the beginning, supporting the world

Chapter 156: War Elephants Attack
The entire army lined up in front of Huanghua Post, with a total of more than 750 combat soldiers and more than 170 auxiliary soldiers. The firearms battalion commander Ferreira brought a team of musketeers, and another musketeer team was on the way, only six miles away from Huanghua Post, which was a little comforting.

All in all, Danchu only had about 900 soldiers. Including the Second Musketeers who were still on the way, there were only a little over 1,000 soldiers, and after a rapid march, the soldiers and horses were tired.

However, the enemy army had fewer cavalry and fewer vanguards. If the Zhaoyong army launched a counterattack first, they would be able to defeat the enemy's vanguard before the enemy's troops could gather.

At about noon, the Zhaoyong army formed a three-fold formation, with the cavalry battalion in front, the personal guard battalion and the musketeers in the middle, and the auxiliary troops in the back, shaped like an olive, with pointed ends and a thick middle.

The Triple Formation was a common tactic used by the Ming army, and was initially popular in the nine northern frontiers. The Dashun army was mostly composed of Yulin frontier troops, who developed the Triple Formation tactics from the Triple Formation. Even the Zheng family army in Fujian was inspired by this and formed a formation of "front row with spears, second row with shields, and back row with Japanese guns".

With a sound of gunfire, the central army raised a red flag, and the Zhaoyong army began to advance. After forming a battle array, the soldiers and horses did not move very fast. The soldiers ate dry food while advancing. Before the battle, they had to replenish their physical strength, and the rice cakes they had carried for a long time could fill their stomachs.

Danchu ate his food while observing the enemy through a telescope. He hadn't seen the enemy's vanguard yet, but the enemy's cavalry often appeared and fought with his scouts and reconnaissance troops from time to time. The smoke and dust in the distance rose straight into the sky, which meant that the enemy had a large number of troops.

Scouts galloped back and forth, passing on intelligence at any time.

"Report to the commander-in-chief, the enemy's vanguard is about three miles away from our army, all of them are cavalry, no less than 500 cavalry."

"Report to the commander-in-chief, the enemy's cavalry and infantry are about one mile apart, and the war elephants are in the front row of the infantry."

"Report to the commander-in-chief, a flag with the word 'Xu' was found among the enemy infantry."

"Report to the commander-in-chief, the enemy's infantry has cavalry on both wings, about 300 cavalry."

"Report to the commander-in-chief, the enemy's infantry marches in columns, with about ten people in each row."

"Report to the commander-in-chief, the enemy's vanguard is two miles away from us."

"Report to the commander-in-chief, the enemy's vanguard has stopped and regrouped."

"Report to the commander-in-chief, the enemy's vanguard has formed a long snake formation."

"Report to the commander-in-chief, the enemy infantry has stopped marching."

……

As the distance grew closer, the scouts' reports became more frequent.

Danchu ordered to speed up the advance to prevent the enemy infantry from gathering.

Both armies came here at a rapid march, and were not fully prepared. Through the telescope, Danchu could see clearly that the enemy army had poor discipline, and was in a mess when they lined up. There were not many armored soldiers, and most of them were holding muskets and bows and arrows.

The intelligence was true. Xu Biao's army had a 1,000-man "gun soldier" all equipped with bird guns, which were light matchlock guns. This was very common in the Guangdong and Guangxi armies. Chen Bangfu's army also had a 2,000-man gun soldier.

"Damn it! What are you afraid of? It's coming!" Dan Chu cursed and sighed.

The commander of the firearms battalion, Ferreira, also took out his telescope and discovered that the enemy had launched artillery. Although it was light artillery such as the Tiger Crouching Cannon and the Weiyuan Cannon, it could still cause fatal damage to the cavalry.

The enemy artillery was marching with the infantry and was very close to the vanguard, so the artillery could be moved quickly. The Zhaoyong Army's personal guard had only two artillery teams, one of which stayed at Kunlun Pass and the other was still far away. The personal guard battalion and the cavalry battalion each had one artillery post, but only the cavalry battalion's artillery post rushed over, with only six small cannons.

Ferreira said, "Marshal, the enemy has a lot of artillery, so we should charge at them at once."

The two armies were less than a mile apart, and Dan Chu resolutely ordered an attack.

The cavalry battalion commander Wu Jie was injured, and the deputy commander Feng Lin led the cavalry in the front team and quickly advanced towards the enemy cavalry. The enemy did not move, still taking the time to organize the formation and prepare the artillery.

Soon, the cavalry battalion was within a hundred steps of the enemy and stopped to assemble. A hundred steps was still too far for light artillery, and the enemy still did not fire.

The cavalry battalion's artillery sentry stepped forward, moved the only six light artillery pieces to the front of the formation, loaded the ammunition, and fired with familiarity.

The enemy was frightened and rushed to fire. Boom, boom, boom, boom, the sound of artillery fire continued one after another, and lead bullets fell like rain.

The cavalry and the horses lowered their heads involuntarily, praying that the bullets would not fall on them. In an instant, lead bullets fell like raindrops.

If you are lucky, the lead bullet will either hit the ground, raising a cloud of dust, or hit the armor, penetrate the cloth, and be blocked by the armor.

If you are unlucky, most of the horses are not wearing armor, and one-third of the combat soldiers and almost all the auxiliary soldiers are not wearing armor. If the lead bullets hit them, they will be injured if not killed.

On the battlefields of the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, the bullets from three-barreled guns and light artillery had very limited lethality. When the army was fighting, the dead soldiers often wore two layers of armor, which could even withstand light matchlock guns. After the battle, the dead soldiers took off their armor and often shook off "liters" of lead bullets.

The cavalry was in the front and could only withstand the hail of bullets. More than a dozen cavalrymen fell one after another. The artillery had a slow loading speed and basically only had one chance to fire. When the six artillery pieces of the artillery sentry fired one after another, Feng Lin immediately waved the flag and moved forward.

The enemy also began to advance. They were obviously rookies and their formation was very irregular. From the beginning, some stood out, some fell behind, some dared to fight, and some were already showing their cowardice.

"Don't be hasty! Line up left and right! Don't push out! Don't rush forward!" Feng Lin shouted loudly, trying his best to control the formation so that the cavalry battalion's formation would be more orderly and denser.

The squadron's personal guard battalion and musketeers, and the rear squadron's auxiliary soldiers, followed one after another, twenty steps apart.

The cavalry battalion advanced to a distance of sixty steps, and Feng Lin shouted, "Shoot!"

The archers dismounted and shot, drawing their bows and shooting arrows more calmly, and shot arrows at the enemy. The enemy army had a low armor rate, and soldiers fell off their horses from time to time.

The enemy's formation gradually became loose, and the originally straight horizontal formation gradually had loopholes. The soldiers became even more panicked and began to shoot arrows on horseback, but the arrows they shot had almost no killing power.

It is not impossible to shoot arrows on horseback, but it requires long-term training. Everyone says that the Eight Banners are good at shooting arrows on horseback, but most of the Eight Banners soldiers still shoot on foot while dismounting. Only elite cavalry such as the Haixi Jurchens and the Mongolian Eight Banners can really shoot arrows accurately while the warhorse is moving. Most of the Manchu Eight Banners are more like heavy infantry on horseback than cavalry.

As the enemy approached, the musketeers also joined the battle. Most of them used three-barreled muskets, loaded with bullets in advance, ignited three cords directly, fired three bullets at a time, and then jumped on their horses to engage the enemy in close combat.

The enemy troops were still pressing forward, not because they were brave, but because if they retreated they would be killed by the rear troops.

More importantly, there were four war elephants following behind.

"Moo—Moo—Moo—", a shrill cry has sounded, coming from behind the enemy.

Danchu was in the middle of the army and could clearly see four war elephants, each more than ten feet tall, with a platform on its back, carrying three soldiers, one driving the chariot, one holding a bow and arrow, and one holding a spear. The war elephants came galloping at an unexpected speed, comparable to mules and horses.

The ground shook as if a huge army of thousands of horses were rushing towards them. The soldiers of the Zhaoyong Army had never seen war elephants before and were terrified.

Seeing this, Dan Chu hurriedly ordered the front team to retreat. With the sound of a golden gong and a drum, the front cavalry battalion, as if pardoned, split into the left and right wings and retreated to the flank of the central army.

This is a commonly used tactic in the triple formation, where the front team pretends to retreat to lure the enemy to attack the center team.

"Hold still, my soldiers and musketeers! Do not shoot without my order!"

(End of this chapter)